2672km
Bonaire Lac Bay, Sailworks Retro 7.5, iSonic 107, Drake Carbon Slalom 38, Wind 11-15 knots
The wind and the forecast need to communicate better...
Got some more execise plus a couple of decent runs. Practiced pumping.
Roo, per your comment yesterday, I'm trying :) !
Roo, per your comment yesterday, I'm trying :) !
Rigging notes: decided that yesterday's settings needed tweaking. Added 2 cm to downhaul (36 cm base), and with the extra downhaul needed 2 more cm to outhaul (202 cm). This moved the floppy part of the sail an additional 4 cm or so towards the mast from the 'gear cog' marking on the sail. The floppy part is about 18 cm from the cog now. This also loosened up the leach of the sail above the first batten above the boom to better meet the RRG directives, as well as allowing the battens to rotate better around the mast. Boom slightly lower than centered between 2nd and 3rd marks on sail.
Spent some time on the beach talking with Taty Frans and Casper Bouman (PWA sailor NED52) comparing the Gaastra Vapor 7.9 with the Neil Pryde EVO8 7.9. The consensus was that the Gaastra was more rigid and had a deeper pocket while the NP was more neutral and forgiving. The NP definitely had a much bigger luff pocket at boom height (maybe 10 cm) compared to the Gaastra. I then mentioned to Taty how I was rigging the Retros and he suggested that if I wanted more power in light winds I should use the upper clew hole. Lower clew hole for strong winds for control, upper clew hole for lighter winds and more power. Will give that a shot next time I'm on the water, which looks like Saturday or Sunday given the present wind forecast.
I asked Casper about clearing the NP and he cautioned me about using the board as a lever - he used to do that but thought that might be putting too much pressure on the stringers in the board. He wasn't sure and definitely said he wasn't an expert, but shortly after he used the 'board' technique he broke his iSonic in half. Correlation or no connection, he doesn't know. He suggested that while it is more difficult, he will try to swim the sail around so the tip is pointing into the wind and then try to lift the mast at the tip. Hard to do but if the sail does clear, it is sometimes easier to get it to rotate to the correct orientation for the desired direction of waterstarting.
(FYI for anyone that might actually read my posts and be wondering why 'all the documentation'? I archive all this information (plus comments) in my personal blog where I find it much easier to locate the tips. The blog is also creating a 'memory log' for me to enjoy when my 'legend' (age) status starts becoming more of a liability.)
Roo commented:
Sign them up for the team Barton, I know Taty uses his GPS all the time. Would be great to see his speeds and read his insights into each session. Go on get him on board!
I commented:
I'll see if Taty is willing to participate. I have only seen him wear a GPS a couple of times. This is the first time on Bonaire for Casper, not sure how long he will be here.
I've included a photo from Taty's FB pictures along with his comments about the picture to provide some calibration for his Bonaire speeds (in km/hour) which is 35.28 knots.
Taty writes:
Improvement!
Testing training and constantly pushing to get the most from my gears, today I got a bit faster but what i am feeling better about is how quicker I accelerate
Roo commented:
Sign them up for the team Barton, I know Taty uses his GPS all the time. Would be great to see his speeds and read his insights into each session. Go on get him on board!
I commented:
I'll see if Taty is willing to participate. I have only seen him wear a GPS a couple of times. This is the first time on Bonaire for Casper, not sure how long he will be here.
I've included a photo from Taty's FB pictures along with his comments about the picture to provide some calibration for his Bonaire speeds (in km/hour) which is 35.28 knots.
Taty writes:
Improvement!
Testing training and constantly pushing to get the most from my gears, today I got a bit faster but what i am feeling better about is how quicker I accelerate
Roo commented:
We can make him faster, we have the technology, we have the money, we have the...........
I commented:
:)
It would be interesting to see his tracks and where he got his max speed. The times I have watched him practice he is typically BAFing, usually racing against other local slalom sailors. If this is in fact true, it would be interesting to see what he would do specifically running 120 degrees or so off wind shooting for a 2 sec max speed. Wind was funky today so I didn't go to the bay. Next time I have a chance to chat with him, I'll ask him if he happened to download and save the log file for that particular day. If I can acquire it, I'll post it to this thread.
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